"ἔνθεν δὲ προτέρω πλέομεν ἀκαχήμενοι ἦτορ,

ἄσμενοι ἐκ θανάτοιο, φίλους ὀλέσαντες ἑταίρους.

Αἰαίην δ᾽ ἐς νῆσον ἀφικόμεθ᾽· ἔνθα δ᾽ ἔναιε135

Κίρκη ἐυπλόκαμος, δεινὴ θεὸς αὐδήεσσα,

αὐτοκασιγνήτη ὀλοόφρονος Αἰήταο·

ἄμφω δ᾽ ἐκγεγάτην φαεσιμβρότου Ἠελίοιο

μητρός τ᾽ ἐκ Πέρσης, τὴν Ὠκεανὸς τέκε παῖδα.

ἔνθα δ᾽ ἐπ᾽ ἀκτῆς νηὶ κατηγαγόμεσθα σιωπῇ140

ναύλοχον ἐς λιμένα, καί τις θεὸς ἡγεμόνευεν.

ἔνθα τότ᾽ ἐκβάντες δύο τ᾽ ἤματα καὶ δύο νύκτας

κείμεθ᾽ ὁμοῦ καμάτῳ τε καὶ ἄλγεσι θυμὸν ἔδοντες.

ἀλλ᾽ ὅτε δὴ τρίτον ἦμαρ ἐυπλόκαμος τέλεσ᾽ Ἠώς,

καὶ τότ᾽ ἐγὼν ἐμὸν ἔγχος ἑλὼν καὶ φάσγανον ὀξὺ145

καρπαλίμως παρὰ νηὸς ἀνήιον ἐς περιωπήν,

εἴ πως ἔργα ἴδοιμι βροτῶν ἐνοπήν τε πυθοίμην.

ἔστην δὲ σκοπιὴν ἐς παιπαλόεσσαν ἀνελθών,

καί μοι ἐείσατο καπνὸς ἀπὸ χθονὸς εὐρυοδείης,

Κίρκης ἐν μεγάροισι, διὰ δρυμὰ πυκνὰ καὶ ὕλην.150

μερμήριξα δ᾽ ἔπειτα κατὰ φρένα καὶ κατὰ θυμὸν

ἐλθεῖν ἠδὲ πυθέσθαι, ἐπεὶ ἴδον αἴθοπα καπνόν.

ὧδε δέ μοι φρονέοντι δοάσσατο κέρδιον εἶναι,

πρῶτ᾽ ἐλθόντ᾽ ἐπὶ νῆα θοὴν καὶ θῖνα θαλάσσης

δεῖπνον ἑταίροισιν δόμεναι προέμεν τε πυθέσθαι.155

ἀλλ᾽ ὅτε δὴ σχεδὸν ἦα κιὼν νεὸς ἀμφιελίσσης,

καὶ τότε τίς με θεῶν ὀλοφύρατο μοῦνον ἐόντα,

ὅς ῥά μοι ὑψίκερων ἔλαφον μέγαν εἰς ὁδὸν αὐτὴν

ἧκεν. ὁ μὲν ποταμόνδε κατήιεν ἐκ νομοῦ ὕλης

πιόμενος· δὴ γάρ μιν ἔχεν μένος ἠελίοιο.160

τὸν δ᾽ ἐγὼ ἐκβαίνοντα κατ᾽ ἄκνηστιν μέσα νῶτα

πλῆξα· τὸ δ᾽ ἀντικρὺ δόρυ χάλκεον ἐξεπέρησε,

κὰδ δ᾽ ἔπεσ᾽ ἐν κονίῃσι μακών, ἀπὸ δ᾽ ἔπτατο θυμός.

τῷ δ᾽ ἐγὼ ἐμβαίνων δόρυ χάλκεον ἐξ ὠτειλῆς

εἰρυσάμην· τὸ μὲν αὖθι κατακλίνας ἐπὶ γαίῃ165

εἴασ᾽· αὐτὰρ ἐγὼ σπασάμην ῥῶπάς τε λύγους τε,

πεῖσμα δ᾽, ὅσον τ᾽ ὄργυιαν, ἐυστρεφὲς ἀμφοτέρωθεν

πλεξάμενος συνέδησα πόδας δεινοῖο πελώρου,

βῆν δὲ καταλοφάδεια φέρων ἐπὶ νῆα μέλαιναν

ἔγχει ἐρειδόμενος, ἐπεὶ οὔ πως ἦεν ἐπ᾽ ὤμου170

χειρὶ φέρειν ἑτέρῃ· μάλα γὰρ μέγα θηρίον ἦεν.

κὰδ᾽ δ᾽ ἔβαλον προπάροιθε νεός, ἀνέγειρα δ᾽ ἑταίρους

μειλιχίοις ἐπέεσσι παρασταδὸν ἄνδρα ἕκαστον·

‘ὦ φίλοι, οὐ γάρ πω καταδυσόμεθ᾽ ἀχνύμενοί περ

εἰς Ἀίδαο δόμους, πρὶν μόρσιμον ἦμαρ ἐπέλθῃ·175

ἀλλ᾽ ἄγετ᾽, ὄφρ᾽ ἐν νηὶ θοῇ βρῶσίς τε πόσις τε,

μνησόμεθα βρώμης, μηδὲ τρυχώμεθα λιμῷ.’

The men arrive at the Aeaean isle of the sorceress Circe. On the island, Odysseus encounters a stag, saving his men from hunger.

One of the poem’s most famous episodes begins. The opening verses touch on a rich vein of myth and folktale. Circe is the daughter of Helios and the niece of Medea (136–37), the witch who saves Jason and then eventually destroys him. The phrase δεινὴ θεὸς αὐδήεσσα, “a dread goddess who speaks” (136), is also used of Calypso (12.449), like Medea an example of dangerous female sexuality.

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The first adjective, δεινὴ, is familiar enough, meaning some thing or person inspiring not just fear or revulsion, but awe, often used of warriors or gods, suggesting some kind of transcendence. What αὐδήεσσα means in this context is less obvious. Its basic meaning, “voiced,” seems unremarkable. Surely all gods and goddesses have voices? A faint echo perhaps surfaces here, of Odysseus’s encounter with a friendly nymph as he struggles in the sea on the way to Scheria:

τὸν δὲ ἴδεν Κάδμου θυγάτηρ, καλλίσφυρος Ἰνώ,
Λευκοθέη, ἣ πρὶν μὲν ἔην βροτὸς αὐδήεσσα,
νῦν δ᾽ ἁλὸς ἐν πελάγεσσι θεῶν ἒξ ἔμμορε τιμῆς.

The daughter of Kadmos saw him, Ino with the lovely ankles,
called Leukothea, who once spoke as a mortal,
but now is honored as a goddess in the sea.

Odyssey 5.333–35

Once a “speaking mortal,” Ino has crossed the existential boundary into divinity. When Odysseus himself, with the nymph’s help, has himself crossed the same boundary but in the other direction, from the immortal, timeless island of Calypso to Scheria, he is anxious:

ὤ μοι ἐγώ, τέων αὖτε βροτῶν ἐς γαῖαν ἱκάνω;
ἦ ῥ᾽ οἵ γ᾽ ὑβρισταί τε καὶ ἄγριοι οὐδὲ δίκαιοι,
ἦε φιλόξεινοι καί σφιν νόος ἐστὶ θεουδής;
ὥς τέ με κουράων ἀμφήλυθε θῆλυς ἀυτή:
νυμφάων, αἳ ἔχουσ᾽ ὀρέων αἰπεινὰ κάρηνα
καὶ πηγὰς ποταμῶν καὶ πίσεα ποιήεντα.
ἦ νύ που ἀνθρώπων εἰμὶ σχεδὸν αὐδηέντων;
ἀλλ᾽ ἄγ᾽ ἐγὼν αὐτὸς πειρήσομαι ἠδὲ ἴδωμαι.

Oh no! What sort of people are these, whose land I’ve reached?
Are they arrogant, fierce, and lacking in justice?
Or, kind to strangers, with intelligence like the gods?
That’s the voice of girls wafting around me,
or nymphs, who haunt the steep summits of the mountains
and springs of rivers and the grassy meadows.
Am I near people who speak my language?
Come now, I’ll try to see for myself.

Odyssey 6.119–26

The phrase ἀνθρώπων ... αὐδηέντων (125) used in this context suggests that the epithet not only denotes the speaking of human language but also signals a web of associations between Calypso, Ino, and Circe, goddesses who not only speak to mortals but also mark the boundaries between human and divine.

One further parallel allows us to expand our discussion. In the wake of his friend Enkidu’s death, the Mesopotamian hero Gilgamesh sets out to discover “the secret of life and death” by crossing “the Waters of Death” to reach the Land of Dilmun, the poem’s version of the Underworld. Once there, he must question Utnapishtim, the only mortal to have achieved immortality, about how he too can escape death forever. On the edge of the sea, he encounters Siduri, a woman tavern keeper, who tries to discourage the hero from launching on his dangerous voyage:

Gilgamesh, where are you wandering?
The life that you are seeking all around you will not find.
When the gods created mankind
they fixed Death for mankind,
and held back life in their own hands.
Now you, Gilgamesh, let your body be full!
Be happy day and night,
of each day make a party,
dance in circles day and night!
Let your clothes be sparkling clean,
let your head be clean, wash yourself with water!
Attend to the little one who holds onto your hand,
let a wife delight in your embrace.
This is the true task of mankind.

The Epic of Gilgamesh x.iii.1–14
(trans. Kovacs)

The similarities to Circe are obvious, a female figure who meets the hero as he seeks the land of the dead and offers earthly pleasures, then helps the hero on his way to the Underworld. In Circe’s case, there is a second meeting, after Odysseus returns from Hades, underscoring her “liminal” (from the Latin, limes, “boundary”) presence and marking one of many parallels between Circe and both Calypso and the sea nymph Ino. Calypso and Ino are both liminal figures, living on the boundaries of human and divine, mortal and immortal; both help Odysseus on his journey to Scheria, one step closer to the fully human world of Ithaka.

Liminal figures can be useful to storytellers, drawing our attention to the limits that define human existence, prompting us to think about why the boundaries should be in one place rather than another. One of the ways we make meaning is to put limits around things, restricting their range of reference, so thinking about limits is thinking about meaning. Thus, we invest heroes like Achilles or Gilgamesh, both of whom have one divine and one mortal parent, with special meaning because they embody liminality and bring us closer to the boundaries—and thus the meaning—of human existence. Teiresias, the illustrious prophet in Odysseus’s immediate future who lives first as a man and then as a woman, carries the same mythic charge. Circe seems to be one example of a common and very old Mediterranean liminal figure. That she appears to Odysseus on the boundary between life and death signals that she will have some big work to do in his journey.

 

Further Reading

Anderson, W.S. 1958. “Calypso and Elysium.” Classical Journal 54, 2–11. 

Nagler, M. 1996. “Dread Goddess Revisited.” In Schein, S. 1996. Reading the Odyssey. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 141–162. 

Page, D. 1973. Folktales in Homer’s Odyssey, 51–69. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

 

134  ἄσμενοι ἐκ θανάτοιο: “Glad to have escaped death” (lit., “glad [to be] out of death”).

134  ὀλέσαντες: aor. act. ptc. > ὄλλυμι. Lines 133–34 are a repetition of 9.565–66 (the last lines of Book 9), at the end of the Cyclops episode.

137  ὀλοόφρονος Αἰήταο: genitives

138  ἐκγεγάτην: 3rd dual pf. > ἐκγίγνομαι, borrowing the –την ending from the secondary active endings.

139  τὴν: rel pron.

139  παῖδα: in apposition to the relative pronoun.

140  νηῒ κατηγαγόμεσθα: “we landed the ship.” νηῒ is a dative with compound verb and κατηγαγόμεσθα is an aorist middle.

140  σιωπῇ: dative of manner.

142  ἐκβάντες: “disembarking” > ἐκβαίνω

143  ἔδοντες: metaphorically. Lines 143–44 are a repetition of 9.75–76.

144  τέλεσ(ε): “brought about,” unaugmented 3rd sing. aor. > τελέω.

145  ἑλὼν: nom. sing. aor. ptc. > αἱρέω.

146  ἀνήϊον: impf. > ἄνειμι, see εἶμι.

147  εἴ … ἴδοιμι … πυθοίμην: “in the hope that I might…,” εἴ + opt., optative of wish (Monro 312; Smyth 2354).

147  πυθοίμην: "hear," with an accusative direct object.

148  a repetition of line 97

149  ἐείσατο: "to appear," aor. mid./dep. > εἴδομαι.

151–52  μερμήριξα ... / ἐλθεῖν ἠδὲ πύθεσθαι: "I was scheming to...," μερμήριξα with complementary infinitives.

154  ἐλθόντ(ι): dat., agreeing, like φρονέοντι, with μοι. It is perhaps easiest to translate as an infinitive, like the infinitives in the following line: "(it seemed best for me) to go ... and give ..."

155  δόμεναι προέμεν τε: aor. infins. > δίδωμι and προίημι, complementing δοάσσατο. Understand ἑταίρους as the object of προέμεν.

155  πύθεσθαι: "(in order) to investigate," infinitive of purpose > πυνθάνομαι / πεύθομαι (Smyth 2008).

156  σχεδὸν: with the genitive νεὸς ( = νεώς).

156  ἦα: 1st sing. impf. > εἰμί

157  τίς … θεῶν: “one of the gods,” indefinite pronoun with partitive genitive.

157  ὀλοφύρατο: “took pity on,” with the accuastive.

158  ὅς: the antecedent is τις θεῶν.

158  ὑψίκερων: masc. acc. sing.

158  εἰς ὁδὸν αὐτὴν: “onto the path itself,” “right onto the path”

159  ἧκεν: 3rd sing. aor. > ἵημι

159  ὁ: the deer

159  κατήϊεν: 3rd sing. impf. > κάτειμι see εἶμι.

160  πιόμενος: dep. fut. ptc. > πίνω, expressing purpose (Monro 244).

160  ἔχεν: "oppressed" (Cunliffe ἔχω I.42).

161  κατ᾽ ἄκνηστιν μέσα νῶτα: “in the spine in the middle of his back”

162  ἀντικρὺ … ἐξεπέρησε: “passed right through to the other side”

163  κὰδ᾽ … ἔπεσ(ε): tmesis (separation of the prepostion and verb in a compound verb) > καταπίπτω, “to fall down”

163  μακών: aor. act. ptc. > μηκάομαι. The verb is regularly used of the bleating of sheep, but is also used of the sound made by wounded or dying animals (LSJ μηκάομαι).

163  ἀπὸ … ἔπτατο: aor., tmesis > ἀποπέτομαι, “to fly away”

164  τῷ ... ἐμβαίνων: "putting my foot upon him," that is, Odysseus puts his foot on the deer to give himself leverage to pull out the spear.

165  τὸ: the spear, direct object of κατακλίνας

166  εἴασ(α): “I let go," 1st sing. aor. > ἐάω.

166  σπασάμην: “I plucked,” “I gathered.”

167  ὅσον τ᾽ ὄργυιαν: “as long as a fathom,” “six feet long”

167–68  πεῖσμα ... ἐϋστρεφὲς ἀμφοτέρωθεν / πλεξάμενος: “braiding a well-twisted rope from both ends.” Odysseus fashions a rope by braiding together pliant willow branches.

168  πελώρου: the deer (“beast”)

170  ἔγχει ἐρειδόμενος: “supporting myself with my spear.” Τhe middle voice is reflexive.

170  οὔ πως ἦεν: “it was not at all possible”

170  ἦεν 3rd sing. impf., impersonal > εἰμί.

171  χειρὶ … ἑτέρῃ: "with either hand," or “with the other hand” (i.e., the one not holding the spear). Odysseus carries the huge deer draped around his neck (καταλοφάδεια) rather than flung over one shoulder (ἐπ᾽ ὤμου).

172  κὰδ᾽ … ἔβαλον: tmesis ( > καταβάλλω, “to put down”). The implied object is the deer.

173  παρασταδὸν: “standing beside”

174  καταδυσόμεθ(α): 1st pl. fut. > καταδύω, “to go down”

175  πρὶν … ἐπέλθῃ: “until ….” ἄν (κε) is expected with πρίν + subj., but is omitted in Homer (Monro 297; Smyth 2444b).

176  ὄφρ(α): “as long as …. (are) ...” Supply the verb "to be."

177  μνησόμεθα … τρυχώμεθα: hortatory subjs. μνησόμεθα is a short vowel subjunctive (Monro 80).

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Suggested Citation

Thomas Van Nortwick and Rob Hardy, Homer: Odyssey 5–12. Carlisle, Pennsylvania: Dickinson College Commentaries, 2024. ISBN: 978-1-947822-17-7 https://dcc.dickinson.edu/homer-odyssey/x-133-177